6 months (part II)

3.18.14

     That afternoon, I had an appointment with Kate. After my morning of crying, I felt like this was perfect timing since I hadn't put it together when I made the appointment that it would be on our 6 month anniversary.
      I sat on her couch, and it didn't take long for all the emotions to start coming out. I told her about my outburst the previous week over the dishes and my immediate wave of guilt that had consumed me.
     "What you're going through," she started, "is totally normal. Pregnancy after loss is hard."
     "But people struggle with getting pregnant for years," I argued with her. "And here I am after trying for two months and we're pregnant and I'm selfishly saying to God, 'This isn't good enough'? As if that's going to bring Kaitlyn back?!"
     "You have to give yourself grace in those moments," she said, undeterred by my argument and frustration. "When I got pregnant with our second one, I begged God to delay my grieving for Piper until this baby was here safely. He did that, but boy did I have a lot of work to do once she got here.
      "The best piece of advice I can give you is to allow yourself to grieve Kaitlyn as you go through the process, but also try to separate your grief from your joy. You know that you are ecstatic that this baby is here, but you are also comparing your two pregnancies, which is unfair to this baby. You had Kaitlyn for 9 months, you knew her. Don't try to expect those feelings with this baby when you are only a few weeks pregnant."
        I left Kate's feeling relieved and exhausted.

       The last appointment I had that day was with Dr. Jim Denison, the pastor who baptized me when I was 8 years old. At some point in January, I had reached out to him through his facebook page and just told him that because his words had comforted me at such a young age, I felt better prepared for the death of my own child. His response came that same day from his assistant:

Dear Amy,

Thank you for one of the most encouraging notes I've received.  I am so glad to hear from you and deeply honored that God would use my words in your life.  His word never returns void!

The loss of your child is the most devastating pain anyone can know.  God's grace and comfort, using your experiences so many years ago, is just one example of his love for you.  I am so sorry for your loss, and grateful for his grace.

It would be my privilege to meet with you. If you'll reply to this email, my assistant will find us a time together.

God bless you!

Jim

        I'm not going to lie, I was pretty excited but nervous to get to meet with him. I didn't know if he would remember me, but I definitely remembered him and the void that was left when he decided to leave our town and come to Dallas. I headed down to his office that afternoon, but the address I had put into my GPS took me to downtown Dallas, even though his office was really in the north half of the city. I ended up figuring that out once I fought the traffic the entire way downtown and did a u-turn, but finally ended up at the right location a little harassed.
       Dr. Denison met me in the lobby with a handshake and said, "Hi Amy, its good to see you."
       "It's really good to see you, too! Do you remember me?" I asked, not really expecting him to.
       "It's the weirdest thing, but I do remember you," he said to my surprise. "21 years changed you a little bit, though."
         We went into his office that was split off into a main office and a separate study that had a round table with four wooden chairs. As we sat down, he asked me to update him on what all I had been up to in the last 21 years. I took him through my time in high school, college, and how I had move to Dallas immediately after I graduated to accept a job in the medical field.
          Then we were able to talk about Kaitlyn. We talked about Alex's deployment, and how God had brought him home just in time to meet his baby girl. We talked about the road after the loss, and how much it had changed both of us. We talked about the peace that resting in our salvation in Christ had brought us.
          "That peace is one of the gifts of the spirit. Like it says in Philippians 4:7, it is 'a peace that transcends understanding' or 'a peace beyond understanding'. But in the Greek, the phrase is actually, 'a peace that wisdom can not produce.'"
           I had to let that sink in a little bit. I liked the Greek phrasing much better than any other phrase I had heard.
           "Can we just read every verse in Greek?" I asked him, jokingly.
           "We lose so much of the depth of the Bible when we translate it to English because our words don't have as much meaning behind them," he chuckled his response.
           We talked about those first few days after we said goodbye to Kaitlyn, and I told him the story of our first Sunday back at church. I talked about how I really hadn't wanted to get out of bed that morning, but how Alex had practically dragged me out.
           "I don't know Alex, but I sure would like to meet him someday!" Dr. Denison laughed as I told the story of my resistance.
           "Yeah, and do you want to know what the take-aways from the sermon were that day?" I continued. "God is good, and His plan for us is good."
            With that, Dr. Denison literally put his head in his hand and laughed at the awesomeness of that timing in our life.

            At the end of our conversation, Dr. Denison asked me if it would be okay if he contacted me if he heard of anyone in his church that had lost a child the way we lost Kaitlyn.
            "Absolutely..." I said as we left his office. "And I write a blog that I started a week after Kaitlyn passed." I took out some of the cards I had made up and gave them to him.
            "You might regret giving me these..." He laughed as he took them.
            "No," I shook my head. "That's one of the purposes in Kaitlyn's life, for us to talk about her and to show God's mercy in our story."

With that, I left his office and headed back home.
         

6 months (Part I) [updated]

3.18.14

     Six months. It had been six months since we held Kaitlyn in the hospital room, crying over her lifeless body and completely traumatized by the events of that morning. So much life had happened in six months.
      I had taken the day off, not truly realizing what day it was, but I had committed to helping the morning Bible studies with their Hope Box gatherings at church. I'm so glad that I did, because that morning, I was a complete wreck.
      I checked in on facebook to see what the world was up to (typical for me in the morning), and I saw that my friend Liz had gone into labor. I don't know if it was just the day, or if I was overly emotional from the pregnancy hormones, but I completely lost it. Alex had gone to work, so I was alone in the house with our dogs.
      I wailed. I cried one of those cathartic cries that completely takes it out of you when you're done. You feel like you've run 3 miles when you haven't been training for it at all. I cried out to the ceiling, "I MISS KAITLYN" at the top of my lungs. I keep our Jenny Bunny on my nightstand right next to Kaitlyn's urn and her pink candle, and I grabbed that bunny and sobbed into it. I cried over the loss of our daughter like I hadn't done in quite sometime.
      When I felt like I was done, I was exhausted. The Bible Study started at 10, and I was severely tempted to call it off and just spend the rest of the day in the safe zone of my bed. But instead, I drug myself out of bed and shook of the racks of grief that I had just given in to. I decided I wouldn't check facebook for a few hours because all it was going to do was add to my anxiety over Liz's birth and to my sorrow of not having Kaitlyn.
      I threw on a shirt, halfway put on some makeup, and then headed out the door. Michelle had decided to tag along and see how we did the gathering, so we met at the church right about 9:45. As we walked into the building, I was trying to focus on the bigger purpose here. We were going to make a difference today by loving on some moms we had never met with these ladies, and I was excited about that.
     The way I had set up the Hope Box gatherings through my church was to first go and share Kaitlyn's story and hand out lists of all the things that were needed in the boxes. As we waited for one of the leaders to get everyone's attention, I stood rehearsing a little bit about what I would say.
      Obviously, I could talk about Kaitlyn for days. But in this setting, I didn't want to bring all of the attention just to our story. I wanted to be sure to highlight what God had done with our story, and how Hope Mommies had helped me focus on God's plans for us and not get bogged down in the despair of losing her.
       Soon, I was handed a microphone and put in the spotlight in front of about 50 women. I started with introducing myself and how long I had gone to Hope Fellowship, and then I talked about Alex's deployment and our pregnancy, and finally finished with our loss. I shook my head as I remembered the images of Kaitlyn's still heart, just as vivid as they were the day we lost her. But then, I shared about Hope Mommies and what an amazing ministry they were. How they had reached out to me through God's divine connections (a wife of a friend that I barely knew), and how they had supported me through my grief and how I was determined to do the same for others. I shared that this ministry was not in North Texas, something that the women just couldn't believe. I shared the statistics that 1/160 pregnancies end in a stillbirth. And I shared my heart for how the women of Hope could have a Hope Box Gathering that would allow us to bring this ministry to Dallas.
     The response was amazing. I had been concerned that some people may not have wanted to participate or that they wouldn't understand how needed this ministry is. But I was wrong. The hearts of these women were full and ready to love on sisters that they didn't even know, just like some of the other groups I had shared with and were set up to do gatherings with.
   

      We finished up introducing the Hope Box gathering, and I asked Michelle if she wanted to go grab some breakfast with me down the street.
      "Of course!" she said, as we piles all the boxes into my car. We headed down the street and shared a meal and our stories. Michelle had read my blog and knew all of Kaitlyn's story, but I had only picked up bits and pieces from her. She had wanted to birth her son, Jaxon, at a birthing center very close to the Big Baylor hospital downtown. What I hadn't known about her story was that they tried to induce her and didn't monitor Jaxon while they induced. They sent her home. My heart broke again as I heard her story of regret and loss, and I tried to reassure her that if that was God's plan for Jaxon's life then there was nothing that she could have done differently to keep him here.
     Eventually, I shared with Michelle that I was pregnant again. She dropped her fork on her plate and leaned across the table to give me a high-five. I couldn't help but bust out laughing!
     "That's awesome!!" she said. "I can't wait until I'm there, but that's great!"
      It was so fun to get to share our pregnancy with some of the ladies that had been through a loss because there's so much celebration of life. We sat and chatted some more over our breakfast, but eventually it was time for me to go.
      I had an appointment with Kate that afternoon.

An Email

3.18.14

     Since I had been sharing our story at church and through a couple of outlets, I had decided a few months back to get business cards made up to hand out at things instead of having to repeat "Kaitlynlives.blogspot.com" 50 times. Anyone who knows me personally, this probably doesn't surprise you at all. 

The front of my blog cards, the back just has the 

same picture that we've used for everything on it with

Kaitlyn's toes and the verse from Jeremiah.

      I had tucked one of these cards in each of the letters that I had written to Priscilla Shirer and Lisa Bevere back in February. I had also decided to set up an email account on the blog that would forward to my personal email so that if people wanted to get in contact with me for whatever reason, they could (you can find this in the "contact me" section up on the right hand side of the screen). 

       I hadn't had any emails forwarded, and out of pure curiosity I decided to check my email that day. I had two emails that hadn't been forwarded correctly. One was from a lady that was in my Bible study group had asked me to come speak at her MOPS group (Mothers Of Pre-Schoolers), and one was from Priscilla Shirer. 

       The Priscilla Shirer. The original email had been sent on March 4, only about a month after I had heard her speak at the conference. I wasn't able to speak to her directly that weekend, but I had given one of the workers the note I had written for her. 

From: Priscilla Shirer <priscilla@goingbeyond.com> Date: March 4, 2014 at 9:03:46 PM CST To: Kaitlynlives2013@gmail.com Subject: From Priscilla Shirer Hi Amy, I wanted to reach you to say THANK YOU. Thank you for giving me that tender, sweet note during my recent trip to your church. I was so blessed to read every word of it. Tears stung my eyes as I thought of you and all that your family has been through. I am so grateful to the Lord for using "Gideon" to encourage you in some way. That blesses me to no end. Thank you Lord. And knowing that the way my friend's mother handled her daughter's passing was able to be used by God to give you direction and hope is a testament to God's grace. He IS USING YOU. There is no doubt about it. Nothing you have suffered will be in vain. In Jesus Name. Keep writing sister. . .and keeping hoping in our great God. Bless you, Priscilla

    I was completely blown away. I was completely honored and humbled that someone like her would take the time to sit down and write out an email to encourage me, and she told me to keep writing! I was so excited and I quickly wrote her an email back to thank her for the note back, and to apologize for my tardiness in replying. 

    I told her that the next day would mark 6 months since we lost Kaitlyn, and that her note was extremely timely because I had been feeling down all that day in anticipation of the next. 

The Difficult Day

3.15.14

     Mallie had let me know that there was a professional photographer's expo on Saturday, and that her and another area coordinator for Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep were going to try to recruit photographers to volunteer for the organization. I immediately asked if they needed a recipient to go as well, seeing as it might mean more if there was someone there to vouch for how much the pictures mean to the families. She said she would love for me to come, so we set up our time to meet.
     Remember that picture we had made back in the fall? I took the finished product with me over to the expo for two reasons: first, I thought it was so interesting and unique that it would bring photographers over to the table just to look at the piece, and second, it is the best thing that we've done with our pictures of Kaitlyn because it stays up on our wall. Its a beautiful reminder of our sweet baby girl's short life and adorable feet.

   

Our front room where Lisa's piece is displayed.

Pictures really don't do it justice.

      I drove over to the mid-cities area, not really knowing what to expect. I didn't know how people would react, but I think in my mind I generally expected people to be receptive to the idea of giving back to families who had gone through this loss. I had printed out all of the pictures that Mallie took (from Walgreens, which I'm sure in retrospect was a poor idea because here I am with all these professional photographers and I choose just about the cheapest way to display their craft...), and headed in with our Lisa piece and those in hand.
     We set up the table, and we waited. It wasn't an extremely busy expo, but there was a steady stream of photographers that would come by and glance or try not to make eye contact, and every so often one of them would pause to look at the pictures. The other area coordinator had brought a framed picture that was clearly done outside of a hospital in a studio, but pictured a mom embracing her child. Slowly, a handful of people started to stop by. I let Mallie and the other Area Coordinator do their pitch about the organization, and sometimes they would say, "And we have a Mom here that needed our services last fall, and she wanted to come to help talk about how much this organization means to her."
       That is, if they could get that far. Most of the photographers started backing away as soon as they heard the term "stillbirth" or "death of a child".
        "Oh, I could never do that..." they would say. "That's just too hard. How could you even go into a situation like that?" On, and on the excuses went. NILMDTS is absolutely desperate for photographers in our area. They only have 3-4 covering all of Dallas, and statistically that means a lot of calls per photographer each week. In fact, sweet Mallie was leaving the expo to go take pictures for a family right afterwards because nobody else was available.
         "I photograph animals, and sometimes if the animal is old... well... Let's just say people's pets are a lot like their kids. So I can relate to this, it's kind of what I do, too." One photographer said. I almost wanted to reach over the table and shake them. A pet is not a child, thank you very much. Even though we love our dogs immensely, I didn't grow any of them in my stomach, or set up a nursery for them, or talk to them while they were still unaware of the world. I didn't plan things for their lives like I did with Kaitlyn.
         At the end of the day, one final lady came by and she was the coordinator of the Dallas Area Professional Photographers' Association. She was one of the last ones to stand and talk with us, and was even brought to tears as she flipped through Kaitlyn's pictures. She said that she would invite Mallie and the other coordinator to come talk at their next meeting, but I'm not really sure if that ever happened.
       I didn't expect it to be that hard listening to people say no, but the truth is I left there feeling sad but also incredibly grateful. Now that I know how difficult it is to recruit photographers for those positions, I know that we were extremely lucky to have Mallie be so available for us. She captured some of the most precious memories that we have of our sweet Kaitlyn, and she was at the hospital so incredibly quickly it was a little ridiculous.

Speaking for the first time

3.13.14

     Thursday night was busy: I had a dinner meeting for my job and at the end of the night I had committed to speak at my friend's sorority meeting as an "inspirational speaker". Needless to say, I was a little stressed.
      I was lucky to arrive at Sherri's right on time for them to finish eating some delicious chicken gumbo she had made (I had to leave the business meeting so early I didn't get my meal), so I grabbed a bite and then we circled around Sherri's living room. I had brought my hope box with me, and had been rehearsing all day what I would say.
      I started at the beginning. I talked about Alex's deployment, and our pregnancy, and all the blessings that came with being pregnant. And then I talked about losing Kaitlyn and the sorrows that I felt after that moment of loss that continued for months. I told them about Hope Mommies, and about how the ministry wasn't in Dallas, but that we needed sponsors to help, or women that we were willing to put together boxes.
       The sweet ladies all nodded and cried along with our story. Some of them knew of women who had been through similar experiences. Some of them had no idea that stillbirths and infant losses were so prevalent in our world.

        The next morning, I got a call from Sherri thanking me for coming to speak to her group. I told her that it was my honor, and I thanked her so much for allowing me to share Kaitlyn with them. You see, Sherri is the manager who ran interference for me the day Kaitlyn passed (by asking all of the lab staff not to text me, and later telling them what had happened), and the day that I went back to work by sending an email to the staff giving them the right phrase to use with me. I owe her so much. But now, Sherri called me to tell me something else.
         She told me that her sorority had committed to giving $200 a year to Hope Mommies for the Dallas Area Ministry. She said that her ladies were so touched by our story that they felt called to movement, and they wanted to be able to do something tangible to help. It was amazing. I immediately started crying because it was such a generous gift. The money would be able to help moms here locally connect and not feel abandoned.

God used us again to grow His story and show His love.

Dinner with friends

3.12.14

    Wednesday rolled around and I was able to do a little bit of house work before I headed out the door to work. It happened when I was unloading the dishes, and I have no idea what triggered it. I just started crying uncontrollably.
     I missed Kaitlyn.
     It had been a while since I had let myself come apart, but being alone in the house and doing a mindless task seemed to be just the catalyst I needed. I just cried. I mourned for her. I missed her. The thought came across my mind of, "I don't even want this baby, I just want Kaitlyn." and then I immediately felt guilty and ashamed. I didn't know what to do, so I just cried. I begged God to forgive me for those thoughts, because on some level I felt like it was a slap in the face to Him. Here, I had prayed and begged for months for us to get pregnant quickly, and as soon as we did I was being the brat and saying that it wasn't good enough to be pregnant, I had wanted my first born. There are people that struggle for years to get pregnant, and we are fortunate to not be one of those. Yet here I was, being completely ungrateful.
     After I felt like I had cried enough, I sat down to write Kate an email to see if she had an appointment that I could book with her the next week. I felt like I needed to talk to another Mom who had lost and yet carried her second child to understand what I was feeling. She had an appointment the following Tuesday, and I was extremely grateful for that.


     On Wednesday night, the Erin had let us know that she was going to be in town for a few things and she wanted to get together with the Dallas area Hope Moms. This meant a reunion of our group that went to the retreat in early February, and I was so excited! It also marked the first time I had seen Elyse since retreat time. We had texted back and forth and kept up with each other on facebook, but hadn't met face-to-face since Austin.
    I was the first one to arrive at the restaurant in Lewisville, and not 2 minutes after I got there Elyse walked in.
    "Hang on, I've gotta go to the bathroom. This is a long way from Dallas!" she said as she trotted off to the back. We ended up getting assigned a booth in the corner of the restaurant that would hold all 7 of us that had RSVP'ed that we were coming. I had also invited one Hope Mom that hadn't attended the retreat, named Michelle, that Mallie had taken pictures for in November. Michelle had lost her sweet boy Jaxon during birth in downtown Dallas, and I had sent her a hope box as soon as Mallie had gotten me her information. It was the first time I would meet her face-to-face, but we had also emailed back and forth quite a few times as we walked the road of grief together.
     Soon, Elyse came back and found me in the booth checking my phone to make sure no one had texted me for directions. She wiggled into the seat next to me, and we started catching up.
     "I have something to tell you... but I don't know how to and I don't want it to hurt your feelings," I started. She waited patiently as I stared at my hands. "I'm pregnant."
     "Me too!!!" she squealed, giving me a big hug. "Oh my gosh I'm so excited! When are you due?"
      "November 13!" I said, hugely relieved that I had not only not upset her, but that we would get to walk the road of pregnancy after loss together.
      "I'm November 6th! That is too cool!"
       We spent the rest of the time talking about how weird pregnancy after loss is, and how many emotions we had gone through in such a short period of time. Elyse had told me that she didn't have any anxiety over being pregnant, but just that she was blissfully happy that they were pregnant again. I felt that stab of shame over my outburst of crying and thoughts from earlier in the day, but I didn't dare to share them with her.

        Once Erin got there, the 7 of us who had experienced such pain talked about where we were. There was one Mom who had just lost at the beginning of February, but told her story with such grace and strength that I was blown away. Michelle shared her story with Erin, and told Erin how much Hope Mommies had helped her and encouraged her in her grief.
         We also talked about outreach. We talked about getting together with our churches and getting more Hope Boxes for the DFW area. We talked about targeting certain "high volume" accounts to be sure we reached as many moms as possible. We talked about how God was leading each of us into our own little areas of ministry. And at the end of the night, we prayed over Dallas. We prayed for the moms that would need the ministry, and that the hearts of the administrators in the area would be open for our ministry to be in their hospitals. We prayed for the families that would lose their children, and that they would take comfort in the stories and hope of others.

Old Friends

3.11.14

     Happy Three Year Wedding Anniversary to me and Alex!

     The call came at approximately 7:45 AM, my boss needed me to go to Waco for a case that would start at 10 AM. Now, if you know anything about Dallas, you know that Waco is about 2.5 hours away if you don't mess with any Dallas traffic. I was about to mess with Dallas traffic. I jumped in my car and tried to elbow my way through downtown to get to the other side of I-35, and eventually made it to the case in time to cover a whopping hour-long procedure. I was finished right at lunchtime.
      I have a friend from college who went to Baylor Law school after we graduated and practices in Waco. She was about 37 weeks pregnant, and for some reason I just got a wild hair and decided to text her to see if she had time for lunch (not truly expecting her to have the time since she's a busy lady). Within minutes, she had texted me back and confirmed a time and a place for lunch. Now I was excited about being in Waco since I hadn't seen Liz in about 4 years, since she got married.
       As we sat down to lunch, we reminisced over old college times (we were in the Longhorn Band together at Texas), and about how different we are now that we are old and married. Finally, we got around to talking about her pregnancy, she was having a little girl.
      "Have you guys picked out names yet?" I asked
      "No, not yet. We have some that we like, but we decided that we would wait until she gets here and see what she looks like before we name her." Liz shrugged.
       "Do you have a birth plan?"
       "Get to the hospital," she laughed through her response.
       "Okay, that's a good plan! I think those things always fall through in the end anyways," I told her. "I wanted to do all-natural before we figured out that Kaitlyn was breech... and then everything went the way it did anyways..." I trailed off. "We can totally talk about something else if you'd like to- I don't want to make you more anxious than you probably already are."
        Liz shrugged, "It doesn't make me anxious. To be honest, when everything happened I was right at 13 weeks pregnant, and I had been so worried about everything, everything up to that point. I mean, full blown anxiety before every doctor's visit. But then that happened with Kaitlyn and it was like... God used that to wake me up. I'm not in control. He's in control."
         That was absolutely one of the best compliments we could have been told about our story. That Liz was able to release her anxiety because of our loss...  That just means something to me. Our story helped someone.
          Liz and I were in a few Bible studies together in college, and she was one of those people that changes your spiritual walk. To be honest, without her I'm not sure what my walk would have looked like through college. She kept me plugged in with other believers, and she kept me accountable. To hear that our story helped her, well, I guess that's just one of the beautiful ripple effects of Kaitlyn's life.

So many emotions

3.9.14

    The rest of Sunday was pretty much an excited blur. We ended up spilling the beans to my parents, who happened to be with my grandparents, who are notorious for not being able to keep a secret so we ended up telling my entire extended family.
     Although we were incredibly elated at being pregnant and being able to get pregnant so easily (realistically, this was only the second month we had really been "trying"), there were also all these bittersweet emotions that went with the positive pregnancy test.
     I was happy to be pregnant, please don't misunderstand that, but I was also reminded of a year earlier when I had found out I was pregnant with Kaitlyn. And with Kaitlyn I knew I was pregnant before I was even late, so it was just... different somehow.
   
      I remember the morning I found out I was pregnant with Kaitlyn. It was a Thursday, and it was about 4 days before I could be late. Alex was still stationed in El Paso, and I was in the process of applying for the job I have now. I had been talking to a work friend about us trying to get pregnant and on Wednesday morning, I was so excited because I had heard back and set up an interview with the new company for the job. When I went to talk to her about the interview, I said, "Guess what?!" and she replied, "You're pregnant!", which made me pause for a minute before I said, "Well, I could be, but I'll have to get back with you on that tomorrow!" And then I launched into the story about the new job.
      Thursday morning, I had gotten up, used a pregnancy test, and went into the kitchen to get my coffee. I wasn't expecting to be pregnant because we hadn't been able to get pregnant when Alex was on Christmas leave. Then, with coffee in hand, I walked back into the bathroom and peeked at the stick on the back of the toilet.
       There were definitely two pink lines.
       Fun fact about Texas: We have two time zones. So at 6 AM when I saw the second pink line, it was 5 AM in El Paso. So I decided not to call and wake Alex up just yet, but of course he scolded me for that later.
       So instead, I stood there with only our dog by my side and stared at the two pink lines. I'm fairly sure I was a statue for about 15 minutes, trying to figure out what all that meant for me and Alex, since he was deploying in a few short weeks.
        An hour later, Alex finally texted me that he was awake. I immediately called him and told him the news, "Whaaaat?" he said, but I could hear the smile in his voice.
        "I'm not 100% sure yet, I just took one test and I feel like I should take another just to be sure. You know, in case it's a false positive or something." I tried to slow down all the excitement and be logical for just a minute. So on my way to work, I picked up another box of pregnancy tests and snuck into one of the hospital bathrooms to test it out.

      It didn't even take the whole three minutes. Two pink lines appeared again.
      At this point, I was ecstatic. It was official, we were pregnant with our first baby. I'm fairly sure half the people that I work with knew I was pregnant within the first 48 hours simply because I work in a high-radiation (x-ray) environment, and as soon as I had that second confirmation I started standing behind lead walls and running to the back of the room anytime someone stepped on the x-ray pedal.

      This second pregnancy, though, I needed to wait. I can't really explain it, but at the main hospital I go to, those people are my extended family, and I know they want good things for us. But what goes along with that is that they will inevitably have a lot of anxiety once I told them we were pregnant. I was already wrestling with the dualing emotions of being elated and sorrowful, and I didn't want to add in anyone else's emotions or reactions during this time.

      So, for a while, I kept it quiet at work. I didn't tell anyone. I needed to process things in the quiet and safety of my marriage. One night that week, I woke up to Alex turning the overhead light on. I started awake and asked, "What's wrong??" To which he replied, "You were having a nightmare."
       "I was?" I asked him, confused on what was going on.
       "Yes, and I needed you to wake up." At that point, I'm not really sure what triggered it in the wee hours of the morning, but I had a complete panic attack and started crying hysterically. "What's wrong?!" Alex asked.
        "I'm scared of losing this baby, too," I cried into his arms. Eventually, I cried myself to sleep and tried to redirect my thoughts away from the possibility of saying goodbye to another child.

Let's make it official

3.7.14

     Friday morning I took another pregnancy test. I had tried to relax the night before by going to bed early and taking a long shower. Nothing happened that night, so I figured I would know one way or the other in the morning.
     I came out of the bathroom with the stick in my hand and Alex said, "Well?"
     "UGH I can't tell!" I said, frustrated.
     "What do you mean you can't tell?"
     "Well, I think there's something there- that it's positive. But I can't tell if there's really something or if its just the light or my mind playing tricks on me because I want it to be positive."
     "Here, let me see it," he said, taking the stick out of my hand. "I think this is positive... Maybe..."
      "Well at least its not just me."
      "What do we do now?" He asked.
      "Wait a little longer and do another test, I guess." At this point, I can honestly say I was getting a little bit nervous. I was thinking that I should have had a solid pink line saying I was pregnant, or the opposite. The fact that everything was still up in the air and I was late just made me flat out anxious.
     
        On Saturday evening, we went out to eat with our Bible study leaders, Bobby and Elaine. We met them at a Tex-Mex restaurant in north Dallas, and when we got there each of them had a margarita in front of them ready to go with their meal.
        When I didn't order a margarita (which, I probably would have), they both gave us an inquisitive look.
         "We might be pregnant..." I started, since Alex and I had already discussed that we were going to tell them just for the purpose of asking for prayers since we had no idea what was going on.
         "What do you mean 'might' be?" Bobby asked. "Did you take a test?"
         "Well, yeah!" I said, kind of exasperated. "But it was... inconclusive."
         "Do you think you should take another one?" Elaine asked.
         "I've had three of them negative so far. Two different brands, so its not just the brand not picking up the hormone or something. I don't know what's going on, but I'm not going to risk anything by drinking this early on. We'll get some more tests tomorrow morning and try again." I said.
   

       The next morning, Alex and I went to church and then went to our favorite breakfast place to grab brunch. On the way home, I told him to pull over at a CVS.
       "Don't we have a few more tests at home that you haven't tried?" he asked.
       "Yes but I'm going to get the idiot proof one- the one that says "Pregnant" or "Not Pregnant"- no more of this one line, two line, plus sign business." I smarted off as I got out of the car (he just laughed at me.
        Once we got home, I used the stick. It was a fancy one that even had a digital counter that told you when the three minutes was up. I sat there on the bathroom floor watching the little ticks march across the screen when Alex came into the bedroom and said, "Well?"
        "Its still working!" I said, a little frustrated that it was taking so long.

 And about that time, the final display changed over to the result.

Late.

3.5.14

      Thursday morning was a blur. I had to get up super early in order to head down to the Dallas VA, which is about 20 minutes south of downtown Dallas (in not the best neighborhood).
      Will all that rushing around, it wasn't until mid-morning when I was sitting with a co-worker that I realized it was Thursday. And I was officially a day late.
       Without giving you TMI, I have to tell you that I am one of those clockwork body types, meaning that I get that monthly reminder that I'm a woman the exact number of days apart every single month. I've never been late except when I was late with Kaitlyn, but I had tested positive a few days before that moment so it didn't freak me out.
        This, however, freaked me out. Having just took a pregnancy test on Tuesday, I was positive that I wasn't pregnant, but what could be causing this irregularity? Stress? I do work in a demanding job, but that's never been an issue before.
         After I spent the morning chewing the inside of my cheek trying to figure out if I had counted days wrong (I keep this on a calendar at home, not on my iPhone or anything mobile like that), I called my Mom on the way home.
         "Maybe you're having a phantom pregnancy," my Mom suggested. "I know you guys really want to be pregnant, so your body may be tricking itself into acting like you're pregnant."
         Can I say, "UGH" out loud? Yes, we wanted to be pregnant. Yes, we were trying. But its very unlike me to have emotional issues so bad they cause a physical reaction. So, being the number nerd that I am, I googled it and found that only 1 in 22,000 pregnancies are really phantom pregnancies.
          I texted my Mom the statistic and asked, "Can lightning strike twice?!" I couldn't believe that  a phantom pregnancy would happen now after everything we'd been through. So instead, I resolved to go home and relax with Alex and hope that everything would return to normal. I had also decided not to tell Alex that I was late because I didn't want to get his hopes up for something that was (to me) clearly something else.

         But then I got home, and my sweet husband had gotten us dinner complete with a bottle of wine. I stopped in the middle of the kitchen when I saw the table all set and just looked at him.
         "I..." I started. "I don't think I can drink because I might be pregnant."
          Alex's eyebrows raised up in a surprise and disbelief. "But I thought the test was negative?" He asked.
          "Well... It was. But I'm late. And if I am pregnant, I don't want to risk drinking right now," I finished, setting my bag down on the floor.
           Alex smiled as we sat down to dinner. He didn't say anything else about it, but I could tell he was already getting excited about the possibility of us being pregnant.

Delivering another box

3.5.14

     On Wednesday, Mallie had let me know there was another local mom who had would ultimately suffer a loss (her daughter had Trisomy 18 which is incompatible with life) that she was going to take pictures for and the mom had accepted Mallie's offer of a hope box. We planned that Mallie would go up and take the pictures in the NICU, and that I would come at the end of her session with the box, and then we'd go to dinner.
     I have to tell you I was really nervous. I had no idea what I was walking in to, or what I would say because I don't even know what I would have said to myself while I was still in the hospital. And this family's story was so different because they knew that their daughter wouldn't survive.
     I nervously walked into the hospital with the box under my arm, without my usual scrubs on so I wouldn't get in trouble for not checking in as a vendor. I went up to the L&D floor, and texted Mallie that I was there. Soon, she and the momma came from around the corner where they had visited the NICU.
     "She's such a fighter!" Mallie gushed (the girl seriously has a heart of gold). "She is hangin' in there, and she is GORGEOUS."
      The mom slowly walked down the hallway next to Mallie and gave me a sad smile. Mallie introduced the two of us, and told her how she knew me because of Kaitlyn. Her face dropped a little bit and she said, "I'm so sorry to hear of your loss."
       "I'm sorry for you, too." I said quietly. "I have this box for you, if you'd like it. Its just got some resources in there for you from Moms who have been where you are, and I wanted you to know that you're not alone and when you're ready there's a community that is here to love you."
        About that time, her husband met us back in the room and looked at me inquiringly. I introduced myself and gave him the box talk, but then I told him that we had lost our daughter in September. With that, he hugged me.
        "Thank you for coming," he said. "You give us hope. Here you are 6 months later making the best out of this awful situation."
        I was humbled and honored that he thought so much of me, and it reinforced to me that what I was doing was making a difference (because sometimes, let's be honest, I'm tired and I don't feel up to doing the ministry stuff). Here, again, God used me to help someone else.

And I'm so grateful.

Sharing our story

3.4.14

     Tuesday was our 3 year wedding anniversary, and it amazes me that we've only been married three years and that we've been married three years. We've been through a lot: two deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, long-distance marriage for the entire time, pregnancy, and loss. I still wouldn't have picked anyone else to be in the trenches with me.

     That evening, I had been asked to come to a different Hope Fellowship campus to share Kaitlyn's story and to present the idea of doing a Hope Box gathering at the end of their study. I was a little nervous about presenting the idea to this group because I didn't know anyone there, so I managed to get there a few minutes early and talk to the leaders.
      I told the two leaders about the ministry, and they brought up a couple of good points that I'm going to share just so if there is anyone out there wanting to host a Hope Box gathering they can buffer their story with these thoughts.
      One of the questions was that even though we were putting one box together per 8-10 people so that the cost was lower, there was still a possibility that the cost of donation would be too much for some people. They asked if everyone had to participate (of course not).
       Another question that was asked was, "What if someone here has recently had a loss and this hits too close to home?" and my heart immediately broke. I asked the leader if she knew of someone that had suffered a loss, and she backtracked and said no, but she couldn't say she knew everyone's story in the class. I told her that if someone has had a loss, or if they knew someone that had suffered a loss, that we could get them a box (and this ended up happening a few times).
       Once we got on the same page, I was good to go and we waited for everyone to filter in. When the groups settled down, one of the leaders fired up the microphone and began making their weekly announcements. I sat nervously at the edge of the stage and waited for her to hand over the mic to me.
       I started with our story. One of the hardest things when sharing is to figure out where to "start" our story- and I tend to start when Alex deployed and then go through the pregnancy up to where we lost Kaitlyn.
       Then I share about Hope Mommies. I talk about how much the organization has supported and helped me. How they are completely Christ-centered, and how everything in the group is aimed to help people mourn and grieve but ultimately hope.
       And then, I opened the floor up for questions, and the response was overwhelming.
      "I have a friend that had a loss, how can I get her a box?"
      "Did you say this ministry is not in North Texas?" (The Hope Box ministry is not at any of our local hospitals right now.)
       "Can we host a Hope Box gathering once a month?"
       "Do you need contacts for the hospitals?"
       "What else can we do besides the hope box? Do you need money donations?"

        It was amazing. God had totally taken all my fears and anxieties (and the leaders' anxieties) away and used us for goodness. He had taken our story to another level, again, and Kaitlyn's legacy was living on by inspiring these women to take a risk and donate to an organization they may never (hopefully) need or get anything out of.
        I left there feeling elated, and so glad that God had given me the courage to speak and the right words to say. I felt like I was making a difference in North Texas, and it was awesome to experience.

The things people say...

3.2.14

     I've waited a long time for this post, but its about time that I write it, I think.

     When you go through an unexpected loss, people try to take on the responsibility of making you feel better by saying the "right" thing. First and foremost, there is absolutely no "right" thing when you lose a child. Nothing you can say will make me feel better, nothing. One of the guys I work with hadn't said a word to me about Kaitlyn, and when I first came back to work I had to text him about something and his response was, "I'm sorry not saying anything, I didn't know what to say." My response to him was, "Nobody knows what to say. Quit putting the pressure on yourself to come up with something to make it better, because you never will." He told me later that freed him from feeling awkward around me for not saying anything or saying the wrong thing. Sometimes the best thing you can say is just, "I'm sorry for your loss," and leave it at that.

      Now, that being said. I want to highlight some of the things that have been said to me over the last months for three reasons: 1) because now its kind of funny that people think about these things, 2) to let the Hope moms that read this know that everyone gets those comments, and 3) to help you non-Hope moms that read this have a very clear understanding of what not to say.

     Nobody get mad at these comments: keep in mind that they were said with the mindset that they care about Alex and I, and want to help us, not come off as insensitive.

      At Kaitlyn's funeral: "Did they leave you where you can have more?" (Even now I roll my eyes) An older person asked me this question, and in their mind the only thing that can heal the hurt of losing a child is to have another one (one replaces another, right? right?). Oy. Don't say this.

      A few weeks afterward: "Your soul wasn't ready for a child yet." Um What? I still can't believe this one... So God gave me a child just to take her away because I wasn't ready? How do you explain the teenage moms out there? Their souls are ready? Okay. Again, don't try to make it better.
 
      Pretty much weekly: "She's your angel baby." UGH. I absolutely hate this. I'm sorry, this may be a comforting thought to some moms, but it isn't to me. I know that my daughter is not floating around with wings strumming a harp. Her personality is just a fierce as God made it and she is partying with our other relatives in Heaven waiting on the rest of us to get there (more on the waiting thing later).

      Various times: "I want you to do xx because I don't want this to happen to you again." The "xx" can be seeing a chiropractor, taking some essential oils, getting acupuncture, changing a flat tire in the middle of summer, it doesn't matter. What I hear when people tell me this stuff is, "This happened because you didn't do xx." And honestly, it is one of the most offensive things that someone can say. I look back at my pregnancy, and I did everything right. God totally, 100% blessed me in that. I am able to look back and say, with honesty, there is nothing I will change for our future children. Nothing. Not a thing. Again, this is coming from the heart of someone that wants to protect us from this happening again, but at the same time, it comes off as assuming you know the answer to why this happened. Don't say it, please! 

      Early on: "You don't know why this happened?" or "They didn't find anything wrong with her?" or "I hope, for your sake, that you find out what happened." Sigh. This was allowed to happen because God allowed it to happen. We live in a broken world. If we lived in Heaven, this wouldn't have happened. If we were perfect creations of God, this wouldn't have happened. But we live in a busted, broken, sin-riddled world that the Devil runs rampant in. Don't read that wrong: there is nothing that Alex or I did to deserve this, but at the same time we are not promised perfection in this world. Only in Heaven will we be perfect and there will be no death or tears. Let's get there, people.

      Only once: "Did you donate your breast milk?" Again, coming from someone that is trying to "make the best of a bad situation", but I can't say that I was concerned with someone else's child eating at the moment I was saying goodbye to mine. I do know Hope moms that have done this, and I think that is amazing, but this just wasn't for me. Perhaps if Kaitlyn had been our 3rd or 4th child? Yeah no, let's not think about that.

      Anyways, I guess the point is that there's nothing right to say. Just say you're sorry for the loss, and move on. Don't try to console, because inevitably something like this will pop out of your mouth and it will wound the one you're trying to help.

Oh how He love us

3.2.14

     After the conference ended on Saturday, I ate lunch with my parents and then headed back to Dallas. Alex and I are pretty much creatures of habit and we really love Hope Fellowship, so the majority of our Sundays are spent at our home church unless completely unavoidable.
     Sunday was a big day for us, Alex and I have officially been trying to get pregnant. Officially official. Sunday was the first day I could take a test and see if we were pregnant, and I just felt in my gut that it would be positive. I was pretty excited, but also a little nervous.
     Sunday morning came and I woke up like a kid on Christmas. Let's get this party started! I went in the bathroom and did my thing, and then waited and watched. And watched and waited. You know that old saying that a watched kettle never boils? Three minutes felt like a lifetime.
      I waited.
      I'm making you wait.
      I waited some more.
      Finally, the three minutes were up.
      And it was negative.
      Negative.
      No, that's not right. Must not have waited long enough.
      Five minutes.
      Seven minutes.
      Negative.
      Ten minutes.

     Eventually, I resigned myself to the fact that it was negative, and I just started crying. I went and laid back in bed with Alex and just cried into his chest. I felt pregnant. I knew I was pregnant. Why wasn't I getting the confirmation? Why wasn't that stupid second pink line there? This is dumb.
     My husband, logical and positive man that he is, says to me, "Do you trust God?"
     "Yes," I said between my tears.
     "Then it's not time yet. I don't know why, and you don't know why, but its not time yet."
 
      I hate it when he talks sense to me. Get down in the sorrow and wallow in it with me for a second, will ya'?
      After a few minutes, I picked myself up and decided that the test was wrong. It was just, wrong.
      "I don't believe it, I'm going to retake it in a few days. I just think that it's wrong. It's defaulty, or expired, or something." I said to Alex.

       An hour later, we pulled up to church, my heart still hurting with disappointment in wanting to know why I'm not pregnant yet (what the heck is the hold up?), and we went into the worship center.
       For some reason that morning, the worship leader had decided to pull out an older worship song that had first come out when I was still in college.

He is jealous for me

love's like a hurricane

I am a tree

bending beneath

the weight of His wind and mercy

All of a sudden

I am unaware of these afflictions

eclipsed by glory

and I realize just how beautiful You are

and how great Your affections are for me

and Oh

How He loves us so

Oh how He loves us

How He loves us so

And we are His portion

and He is our prize

drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes

if His grace is an ocean

we're all sinking

heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss

my heart turns violently inside of my chest

I don't have time to maintain these regrets

when I think about the way He loves

Oh how He loves so

Oh how He loves us

how He loves us so

Yeah He loves us

Oh how He loves us

Oh how He loves us

Oh how He loves...

     I cry a lot during worship, I always has. Music reaches my heart in a way that spoken words just can't do. And today was an avalanche of emotions. I was disappointed and saddened that my answer that morning had been, "no", and yet here in the worship of my God, He was reminding me that He loves me. Bigger than that: He cares about my disappointment. God told me "no" for some reason that I will never understand. He said "not yet, but I love you. Trust me." It is so hard, even after everything that we have been through, to trust God. It is hard to give up the facade of control that we all cling to, and I was reminded of that Sunday morning.

     I'm not in control. But someone that loves me enough to die for me is.

Pour. It. Out. (Updated)

3.1.14

     **Yes I broke one of my cardinal rules of blogging- I came back and edited. Just because I felt like I forgot a very important part about expectations. Enjoy.**

      On Saturday morning, Priscilla was back to take the stage. This time, her hair was pulled back off of her face in a ponytail that came down below her shoulders.
      With her on the stage was a bottle of water and a glass sitting on a music stand turned flat-side up.
      Priscilla invited us to turn to Judges, where we find the story of Gideon. Perhaps because I missed the first few weeks of the study and never really caught up, Priscilla started teaching on part of the story that I never connected with. In Judges 6:11-21, the Lord calls Gideon out to be a warrior. Gideon's initial response just makes me laugh (and its one of the reasons I love the Word so much) because of Gideon's honesty to God. He basically says, "If God is with us, why in the H hasn't he taken care of us? Why is this other group of people crushing us and enslaving us?" I mean, the guy has God sitting right there in front of him and he is bold enough to voice his disappointments- no passive aggressiveness here!
    Eventually, Gideon realizes that it is God that is speaking to him, and he asks God to wait there so that he can go and get an offering to present to God. I can only imagine that God is probably chuckling at His creation running off in the distance and yelling back, "Stay there! I'll be right back!"
    Gideon comes back with his offering of meat and broth after who knows how long, and presents it to God. After that quick overview, Priscilla starts to teach.
     "No matter what our state is, we all still have something to bring to God. Even if you don't value it, or think that it is worthy, God sees the value in it," she began. "And let me tell you- if the enemy can't destroy you- he will try to devalue your gifts by comparison to others. He will draw your eyes to what others are bringing, and leave it up to you to devalue what you are bringing. But the challenge is this: what good is our service an our talents if we don't present them to God?"
      Then Priscilla focused on the broth that Gideon had brought as an offering.
      "I want you to imagine that you had slaved for hours to kill this lamb and prepare this meat, and stew this broth. Then, ever so carefully, you bring this meal, these gifts, to God. And what does God tell you to do? He tells you to set the meat and bread on the rock, and then to take that broth that you slaved over and pour it out on the rock." With this last statement, she began to pour out her water bottle into the glass next to it. "Can you imagine what Gideon thought? Here he had slaved away killing, cleaning, and cooking, and God told him to pour it out. When you bring your offering to God, whatever your expectations are for what God will use you for, you need to throw those thoughts away. He will not always use your gifts the way you think they ought to be used."
       "This, ladies, this is what God is all about. We each have gifts, and all of us have different gifts. But if you don't take that gift and give it to God, what use is it? So often times we let our selves get talked out of the glory that God has for us because we think, 'I'm not as good as so-and-so' or 'Her gift is so much better than mine, what could God do with mine?'  Let me tell you something else: I never feel prepared to teach. Every time I get up on this stage, I don't feel prepared, I don't feel ready, I don't feel adequate. But at some point, I have done all the prep work that I can, and it is time to act. And half the time I teach, I am not saying anything I thought about before I came up here. It's just God. I do the prep work, I lay my offering out on The Rock, and God uses me to reach others in ways that are absolutely impossible to me.
      "Ladies, the time to act is now. Do your prep work, but eventually you have to lay that our and give it up to God. Let Him use you. Let Him take your efforts and make them extraordinary. Our God will never disappoint."

This is my challenge to you, faithful blog readers (all 30 of you...)

What are you letting Satan win at? What are you not doing because you see someone else being called in another direction and your gift doesn't feel as valuable? I started this blog 6 months ago as a therapy for myself, and I can honestly tell you it has been one of the most blessed things in my life. I have other Hope Moms tell me that I have helped them. I have had people tell me that my writing challenges them to be better people. But let me tell you, it is still a challenge for me to write. Some days (most days?) I'm tired. I have other things to do. I don't feel inspired to write. But I know how this will all end, and I just have to keep the course until that day comes.

Whatever it is that you feel you are being called to, bring it to God

and pour. it. out.